Lauded by the Society of Polymer Science for the development and industrialization of the PRIMEPOL products; Polyoxypropylene polyol with increased primary hydroxyl content

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Lauded by the Society of Polymer Science for the development and industrialization of the PRIMEPOL products; Polyoxypropylene polyol with increased primary hydroxyl content

2014/05/30News

Sanyo Chemical Industries, Ltd. developed a new manufacturing process for polyoxypropylene polyol with increased primary hydroxyl content, which realized both high-reactivity and hydrophobicity as a polyurethane resin material, succeeded its industrialization in 2012 and launched commercial production under the trade name PRIMEPOL in 2013. We have received the Award of the Society of Polymer Science, Japan (2013) for the development and industrialization of polyether polyol with increased primary hydroxyl content using a new propoxylation catalyst. Sanyo Chemical radically revised the manufacturing process of polyoxypropylene polyol in the late 1990s to succeed in improving primary hydroxyl content (reactivity) simply with ring-opening polymerization of propylene oxide by using the special Lewis acid catalyst. Thereafter, we have aggressively repeated studies of industrialization and market development of this innovative polyoxypropylene polyol.Traditionally, acid catalysts have rarely been utilized industrially in manufacturing polyoxypropylene polyol due to their low thermal stability and resulting by-products such as aldehyde. We have overcome the issue of thermal stability by using a tube reactor that has superior heat removal efficiency and by introducing new reaction control technology, in order to lower the temperature of the reaction system utilizing an acid catalyst. We have also succeeded in establishing the continuous production of high-quality polyoxypropylene polyol with increased primary hydroxyl content by continuously removing by-products from the reactor. This award was granted for the highly-regarded originality, innovation and market effect of this technology, as well as the importance/ripple effect of the continuous production process in its industrialization.